A fighter, a survivor and a proud mother.

Those words only half describe Tonya Thompson. Her scars say the rest.

In May, when she was eight months pregnant, Thompson was involved in a serious car crash in front of Atwell Volunteer Fire Department on N.C. 152.

Thompson’s best friend and co-worker Dana Grady was stopped on N.C. 152, where Concordia Church and Deal roads meet, waiting for an approaching car so she could make a left turn.

The truck behind her, driven by Jeffrey Prince II, didn’t slow down and rear-ended Grady’s minivan, according to an N.C. Highway Patrol report.

The impact pushed Grady’s van head-on into the path of the oncoming car, driven by James Sechler.

Grady and Thompson sustained the most serious injuries.

As rescue workers airlifted Thompson to Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center, they began to perform a Caesarean section to deliver her baby.

“They told me in the helicopter they were going to have to start cutting,” said Thompson, 28.

The amniotic fluid sac around the baby had broken and got into Thompson’s system.

She watched emergency personnel begin the procedure. “They got up to my belly button, and I went out.”

They delivered Thompson’s baby, Caitlyn Nichole, and she is now 4 months old and doing fine.

“I am about positive that they took her out in the helicopter. She was pretty much born in the air over Forsyth County,” she said, laughing now.

Rescue workers had to massage her heart to keep it going during the ride to the hospital.

Caitlyn Nichole only had to stay in the hospital for 10 days, but Thompson had a much longer stay.

“I was kept in the hospital on life support for 19 days. They took me off life support, and I woke up and went home four days later,” she said.

She still has red knots on the side of her neck and legs where she was connected to a machine that helped circulate her blood.

She doesn’t remember much of anything after coming off the helicopter.

“I do remember that they couldn’t get my wedding band off, and they were talking about cutting it. I got out of anesthesia and said ‘No’ and I took it off,” she said.

“I had just gotten it back from the jewelry store from being fitted ... and I wasn’t about to let them cut it off.”

When emergency personnel arrived at the scene of the crash, they found out quickly that Thompson wasn’t going to just give in.

“They cut your clothes off, and I wouldn’t let them cut my shoes off cause they were new shoes,” she said.

She took her shoes off herself.

Later, she wouldn’t let rescue workers take her hand-held radio phone.

“I wanted to make sure someone called my husband before they took my phone from me.”

Thompson has two step-children, 12-year-old Roger and 10-year-old Samantha.

“Our first one died of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) at four months. So this was the last time we were going to try,” Thompson said.

Doctors had to perform a hysterectomy on Thompson because of her injuries.

“They said I swelled up five times my size. The lap belt grabbed and ripped up my insides,” she said.

They didn’t close her incision because she kept hemorrhaging.

“For 19 days, I was tied down and heavily sedated. They were giving me enough (sedatives) to knock out five men.”

She has the scars to remind her, particularly one decorating the middle of her stomach. “They didn’t sew me up, it just filled in,” she said.

“All up my sides I’ve got the tape burns where they took off the bandages, ”

She said the accident occurred in slow motion “like in the movies.”

“I remember the whole accident, I never went out,” she said. “Dana (her passenger) looked up in the rear-view mirror and said ‘He’s not stopping.’ So I just pulled my feet up on the seat and just held on.”

My husband never left my side until the day I woke up.

“He put me in the bath tub and gave me a bath. He really took care of me,” she said. “People have been crawling out of the woodwork to come and see me.”

Her friend, Dana Grady, 34, is still out of work and undergoing physical therapy.

“It twisted her spine pretty bad. She is still out of work,” Thompson said.

“I watched the motor come out between her legs. They had to cut her out. She had passed out, and they had put the sheet over her and she woke up and hollered, ‘Don’t cover me up I’m not dead.’

“We were pretty much best friends, and we were working together, before the accident, and now we see each other every day.”

Thompson’s hospital bills have exceeded $300,000, and she’s started her own business doing commercial cleaning to make ends meet.

“I’d have never started my own business if this never had happened,” she said.